Bumping the door frame as they enter with a seemingly heavy large box, the two women in matching green outfits barely manage to carry it into the front room of our orphanage.
“What is it? What is it? What is it?” a quickly gathering crowd of small orphans demand of our nanny while scrambling to help carry the load.
As excited as the other children, I rush to help, tripping over the loose cardboard base of my shoes.
Holding my hands as high as their six years of growth can reach, I try to help keep the box from falling.
I’m helping, just as nanny says to do!
“I don’t know,” nanny replies, tiny uplifts of her lips framing her lined and skinny face.
“Who brought it?” four-year-old Heda tugs at nanny’s dirty skirt by letting go of the small section of box she had been holding up.
I want to be next to nanny.
I lower my hands from the box, pushing them together before shoving them like an arrow between Heda and nanny.
“It was left by Santa.” Nanny offers, her bony fingers curling over Heda’s fragile left shoulder.
Touch ME!
Love ME!
I’M helping.
Many of the others start jumping up and down, holes in the bottom of their flimsy shoes flitting in sight as their feet rise with squealing delight.
The box starts rocking as its weight is shifted between bouncing kids.
Notice ME!
I push up against Heda; my bigger body moving her away from nanny.
“See ME helping, Nanny?” I ask while looking up into the strained face of nanny.
“Yes, thank you for helping.” Nanny replies, a smile coming to her face as she places her left hand on my right shoulder.
All the other kids are jumping.
I want to stay with nanny.
Rocking from the many heights and altitudes of hobbling holders, the box starts to tip over.
What’s in it?
One of the women in the matching set of green pants and shirt, with a white armband on which sits a red plus symbol, starts to lose her grip on one end of the box.
It crashes to the floor, its contents spilling out from a crack in the side.
Squealers gather, blocking my view for a moment before the contents are revealed to all.
SHOES!
THEY ARE SHOES!
NEW SHOES!
We scramble into a big pile, each of us trying to grab at the shoes.
“There are enough for everyone,” Nanny calls out. “Please look for matching pairs. Everyone will get a pair.”
I just need two!
Grab any two!
Tim elbows me.
Greta kicks him with her socked left foot.
I grab two which look alike.
They look so new!
So Clean!
So Big!
Nanny and the two women in green are on their knees now, moving through the cluster of kids to check each pair of shoes, exchanging the non-matching pairs with each other.
“Check mine, Check mine!” I call out, handing my two toward nanny.
She turns toward me, taking my two shoes in hand.
Please match!
Oh, Please!
Handing them back to me with a full smile, she says, “Hans, you chose well. These will last you a long time.”
“THANK YOU!” I blurt as I dive onto nanny’s shoulders, almost dropping my shoes.
She picks me up as she rises, turning a little so I’m facing the door.
This is the greatest day, EVER!
A small squeeze by nanny around my body comforts me before she puts me down.
I scurry over to the stairs to look at my shoes.
As I sit, I gaze at them.
I can’t believe we got SHOES!
One in each hand, I bring them to me for a giant hug and sniff.
They smell new.
They feel strong.
They are BEAUTIFUL!
Thank you Santa!
Thank you!
Tilting my head to the sky while hugging the shoes tight, I can’t believe this day.
THANK YOU!
THANK YOU!
THANK YOU!
Six-year-old Austrian orphan Hans Werfel shows true JOY in this photograph from 1946. A photographer from LIFE magazine captured the moment Hans sits alone with his new pair of shoes. The shoes were a donation from The American Red Cross, and thus the American people to the war ravaged of Europe. Hans was one of millions of orphaned children from the war. Yet, in this moment, there is nothing but Joy in his life. A new, clean, solid pair of shoes is all he needed to feel such bliss. War often leaves behind the innocent with nothing to their name. How many orphans are there from The 20th Century’s War? At least, in this instance, one found ecstasy from the simplicity of a pair of shoes. What would bring you such Joy? What can you do to help those suffering the ravages of War today experience such joy themselves?
This is Werfel, six-year-old Austrian orphan, hugging a new pair of shoes from America. For nearly five years LIFE reader Mrs. Richard Henry Wehmeyer kept this picture as a visual object lesson. "Every time I heard some petty complaint," she says, she told friends about the little boy with the new shoes, un unfolded the clipping to shoe them.
As Mrs. Wehmeyer said in her letter "This picture of a child's ecstasy over a pair of shoes has meant something personal to me for a long time." It is a special attribute of the photograph that it lasts so long - in a treasured clipping, and in the memory.
LIFE magazine
September 24, 1951